NASA Imagine Mars - Mars Survival Kit

Imagine Living and Working on Mars!

Imagine having to survive on another planet: Mars! Students design a sustainable community, considering criteria and constraints in an engineering and design process, learning Earth science concepts along the way. Human discovery and innovation often depends on our curiosity about science, technology, and society and ways to improve our lives and on our interactions with the natural world. Students build on their prior knowledge of communities on Earth and design their model for a community on Mars.

Students construct scale models of Earth, Moon, & Mars to discover size and scale. Associated Mars Information Slideshow: Through a PowerPoint Presentation, students learn about the environmental constraints that would affect human habitation of Mars.

Students will create a model of the solar system using beads and string, and compare planetary sizes using common types of fruit and seeds. This lesson follows the simple balloon model in Lesson 2, covering the relationships of size and distance in the solar system.

Students gain background knowledge about environmental factors on Mars through taking notes while viewing a PowerPoint presentation. They then clarify the challenges of living on Mars by generating a list of potential environmental problems.

5 min.

1 hr.

Slideshow: Things to know before you go
Video: Mars in a Minute: Is Mars Really Red